Kate Nash opens up about breakdown, drink and drugs

Kate Nash opens up about breakdown, drink and drugs

Pop star KATE NASH has learned to pace herself on her latest tour after drink and drugs got the better of her in 2008 - and her sister had to be dispatched to look after her on the road.

Published 27th April 2010

The Foundations singer has many bad memories from her last big tour, which almost ended with the then-20 year old suffering a breakdown.

Now, 22, she's older and wiser and determined not to repeat the past.

She tells Nylon magazine, "It was just exhaustion, I think. I was very tired, and very emotional... and I was drinking too much. When you have a rider full of beer, it's difficult not to.

"It got to the stage where I couldn't remember the last time I'd had a day off, I was numb to everything."

It was a disturbing moment in Detroit, Michigan that started Nash's spiral downwards - and she wishes she'd taken that as a sign and stopped the tour.

She recalls, "(It was) a really poor part of the city, and (I went) for a walk around the block. There were homeless people everywhere, cracked out of their minds and sleeping over air vents to keep warm. It just made me feel desperate, sad and homesick."

Nash hit rock bottom in Germany two weeks later: "I was on at three o'clock in the afternoon, and after that there was nothing to do but drink."

The singer fell out with her then-manager and "ran off and did, well, all sorts of crazy things". She adds, "My drummer had to come and rescue me."

And when Nash's mother saw photos of the singer at her worst, and heard stories of her vomiting against her tourbus, she insisted Nash's sister join her on tour.

She says, "If I can possibly avoid that kind of behaviour this time around, I will."